Dell first stunned the tech industry by announcing back in
May that it would adopt
AMD Opteron processors for its server systems. In the past few weeks there
has been increasing speculation over Dell's use of AMD processors in notebooks.
Although there was confirmation
of the move from an unnamed Dell executive as well as from a general
manager of AMD’s Taiwanese operations, the company still has not released an
official statement regarding the use of AMD processors in the mobile sector.
The company did, however, announce
today its plans to incorporate AMD processors into its Dimension desktop
range next month along with dual-socket and multi-processor servers using AMD
Opteron processors.

Dell’s adoption of AMD processors for the desktop confirms an earlier
report by a Citigroup analyst back in mid-June. At the time, analyst Jeff
Young reported that Dell would announce entry-level desktops using AMD processors
in September -- the prediction was right on the money. Although Dell failed to
go into detail on how many product lines within the Dimension family would be
introduced or what processors would be used, speculation has been that Sempron
and Athlon 64 X2 processors will be used.

As for AMD Opteron processors in Dell severs, the
announcement comes at a time when Intel is now showing off a competitive
alternative in the form of Woodcrest.
Early testing
has shown that Woodcrest outperforms
the latest AMD Opteron processors across the board while offering lower power
consumption. The same could be said for Intel on the desktop as its Core 2 Duo
and Core 2 Extreme processors have pretty much swept the
boards in performance. It wasn’t too long ago that AMD was enjoying this enviable
position in both the desktop and server arena.

But Dell shouldn’t be too concerned at the moment at AMD isn’t
sitting still. On the August 15, AMD announced its new Opteron Socket F
processors which take advantage of DDR2 memory and a new socket design. The
new dual-core processors are available in speeds ranging from 1.8GHz to 2.8GHz
and can also be had in HE variants which consume just 55 watts of power. On the
same day, AMD also announced that it had taped out its first
native quad-core Opterons. The quad-core processors will be delivered to
customers in mid-2007.

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This article is over a month old, voting and posting comments is disabled

This is business. AMD is recognized as a quality chip mfg now with an improved roadmap to crank out even more chips. They were not in this position ten years ago, or even five. The average guy on the street probably knows by now there is more than one processor company out there that puts out a reliable product. ATI was just icing on this cake.

Plus Dell gains bargaining power by not being tied to one supplier. While AMD server systems in the future may not be as powerful as Intel (and I say maybe, ok?), they will be cheaper, they appear to be at least even on "green" considerations to date, and reliable.

I understand this is a tech forum, but most businesses that survive do not base their purchases on the bleeding edge of technology that comes with a painful premium, nor do they buy on unanalyzed fanboyism.

BTW I hate Dell. Their machines suck. Their business models and choices have, to date, been incredible. (This excludes the early days when they and a few other companies were selling OC chips as standard).

Yep, that's pretty much my point as well. What matters to companies like Dell is not the current performance crown. It's building a good-enough computer at lowest prices to sell at slight profit. Down the road AMD will be selling a platform. They need to get ready for this, and that won't happen if they start thinking and talking about it the day it's available.

And re: performance crown: I'm pretty sure that even here only a select few acually run performance-crown machines. Most will just be basking in the glow of the top-of-the-line CPU while running a much cheaper grade of the same line.